Wow, what a sense of achievement! On February 5 2015, I was handed my certificate for the completion of my Improving Quality Together (IQT) Silver project. Yes I am one of those 10,291 participants who’ve done the IQT Bronze award, completing it a couple of years ago and I’ve now been able to go that extra step forward by completing my IQT Silver.

So what was my project?

As the title of this blog suggests, the aim was to increase the number of times student nurses contributed to ‘academic’ online discussions. I have an interest in e-learning and the reason I chose this topic area was to explore how the use of technology can further enhance teaching and learning.

In January, we invited healthcare students across Wales to consider what it’s really like to be a patient in NHS Wales as part of our ‘a day in the life of a patient’ photo competition. We asked them to put themselves in the shoes of a patient for a day and send us their pictures that promoted empathy, compassion, dignity, respect and person-centred care – and gave us a snapshot of what it’s like to be a patient across the service in Wales. Read more about it in my blog back in January.

I’m delighted to be able to announce our winner in this blog, who has won a place at the International Forum on Quality and Safety in London, taking place later this year in April.

It’s amazing how a picture can capture and tell a story, which is why we are asking for photos to contribute to our ‘A day in the life of a patient’ photo competition. I’m eager to see the stories being told by healthcare students across Wales as they take part.

We are inviting healthcare students across Wales to join in and pick up their smart phones, tablets and cameras between 17 and 24 January 2015 to take a snapshot from a patient’s point of view.

If you’re a healthcare student, we would love you to get involved and use your imagination and creativity to convey what a day in the life a patient looks like; it could be anything from the view from a hospital bed, to what your patient would see on their way in or way out of an appointment – it’s completely up to you what you want to show us – the more creative the better!